Friday, April 13, 2012

If it really is the end of men then why?

There's been a lot of crowing from feminists lately about how men are done for. The most famous example is an article by Hanna Rosin called The End of Men. According to Rosin, men are losing out big time in the workplace and education. The era of women is being ushered in.

But why? Typically, feminists like Rosin attribute the changes to larger impersonal forces, forces that are impossible to resist. They argue that there's something about the modern economy that favours women; the onward march of capitalism is what is putting men out of college and out of work.

What feminists like Rosin fail to acknowledge is that if men's position at work and at university is declining it is due in no small part to the rigging of the system by feminists like herself. Wherever men seem to dominate it is considered intolerable and steps are taken to reverse the situation. But if women seem to have an advantage it is ignored. If this strategy is played out for long enough, then of course the position of men at work and in education will decline over time.

And here is a classic example. Early this month the Gillard Government placed a bill before parliament which will force any company seeking government contracts or financial assistance to meet promotion targets for women:

COMPANIES that get taxpayer-funded assistance or win government contracts will in future have to meet promotion targets for women.

The Federal Government's Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Amendment Bill 2012 will force companies to promote women to management positions and provide them with equal opportunities.

The plan has been rejected by employer groups but welcomed by work-life balance advocates who want companies to be forced to set equality targets and meet them.

Note the odd language: the bill forces companies to promote women to management positions and this is justified as equality of opportunity. Clearly it is not equal opportunity, in which the best applicant wins out, but a rigging of the system to make sure that a female applicant is promoted.

Note too that the bill is not being demanded by the capitalists. Employer groups are worried that companies which either don't need or are unable to afford to create new management positions will thereby miss out on government contracts and assistance (presumably such companies will be under pressure to sack existing male employees).

But the major point is this. According to Rosin the problem is that men can't compete with women in a modern economy. But the truth is very different - the truth is that men can compete and that the state is therefore stepping in to alter the gender balance.

Finally, I'd like to encourage men not to be thrown by such developments. It can be demoralising when you're a young man starting out and you realise that the system is acting against you and that your female peers are all revved up in a career sprint that leaves you behind.

It can be difficult, too, to get motivated when middle class women seem to be delaying family formation for so long and focusing in their 20s on career and casual relationships and a single girl lifestyle.

But men who persevere are still likely to do well in the long run. Younger men can let me know if they think I'm wrong, but from what I've observed of the younger women I know it's typical for middle class women in their early 20s to suggest that they might not ever want to have children; by their mid 20s they are still uncertain but starting to waver; and by their late 20s many have shifted to positively wanting children.

From their late 20s and through their 30s a lot of women will scale down their career commitments. It can be relatively straightforward at this time for a man to push ahead and do well in his career. The statistics show that by their 40s men are generally doing better in the workplace than women - something that not even Hanna Rosin denies.

The point, Mark, is that they believe women are, on average, better than men, and therefore are the "natural" leaders of men. It's only patriarchy, and its leg-ups for men, that ever made men in charge of women. In nature, there are apex males, females, and extra/unwanted males. That is nature. Feminism yearned so much for a return to the jungle so that plain women would have access to alpha sperm. And that is what we have.

It would take a revolution to overturn that, because the taste that women have for alpha sperm is not very easily redirected,

Another couple of generations and the cultures that believe in women having children will have out-bred the current culture that doesn't believe in families and the problem will be solved. In the meantime, it's going to be even worse for us guys.

So is our future a world where women in leadership positions in HR, Finance & Government get to rule over men who get to build and maintain the sewerage systems, roads, electrical / water supply networks and every other essential infrastructure service we have so the said women rulers can dispense their orders in the comfort they are accustomed?

I'm not a fan of Norman Mailer but I like this quote:

“Women love everything about the corporate workplace, they love the carpets, the meetings. For men, every day they have to show up is a little death.”

So much for a meritocracy, now everyone is promoted according to their background and this is justified by a blank slate idea where anyone can be molded to fit any task so why not then promote whoever you wish? Sooner or latter though these systems will go broke, just look at Europe. Do you think a guy like Steve Jobs, as left wing as he was, promoted people according to their gender? He was cutthroat in his desire to have talent. The left as usual are sleep walking through life.

So a person is hired because they're black and a woman. However, they then can't be objectified or defined by their race or gender and must be viewed as a free standing individual ... please.

I believe you to be incorrect about males being able to charge ahead in their careers. Due to things such as student loans, autos, cost of living and housing, men are forced to take on greater debt earlier in their money making careers, making it even more difficult to move up or even laterally. Not to mention, there are always more younger women to take the positions anyway..which is what I am seeing, being unable to find a job and being passed over repeatedly for females.

Also, keep in mind that once the agressive female career person is promoted to a management position - guess what - they tend to hire nothing but females. Entire Higher Ed departments are like this, regardless of the quality of the applicant pool, only female hires.

I believe you to be incorrect about males being able to charge ahead in their careers.

Yes, I should have qualified that statement. I agree with you about higher education. Twenty years ago I had to decide whether to try for higher education and I opted not to. The pressure to employ women at that time was too strong and so I didn't like my chances.

There are certain fields that are most sought after by professional women and these will no doubt be more difficult fields for men to advance in.

Statistics though back up my general claim. Men tend to do better in careers than women by their 40s. There is a simple reason for this: a lot of women by that time have families of their own and their priorities change.

That is crystal clear in the field I work in: secondary education. The lesbian and spinster women stick at it full-time and move into leadership positions. The married women with children either leave or work part-time (typically the women with younger children take their 7-year maternity leave; when the kids are older many come back part-time).

I can't say I have ever noticed women at the top end of management having preference for hiring other women as their next level down.

I'm sure there are examples of the extreme feminist variety that do, but I'd suggest that many "higher management" women act like normal women - they'll hire women they get on with, but often have conflict/jealousy with other women and won't necessarily hire them.

They'll also be more than happy to promote men, and I suspect even more so if they find them attractive in some way.

Feminists are nothing but useful idiots, their purpose is to assist in the destruction of the family, which has largely already been accomplished. I could go into the reasons behind this, but see no reason to do so, those who know, know, those who don't at this point simply don't care to know for the most part. At any rate it'll all be over soon enough. The most likely future is combination of 1984 & Brave New World. The mass of the people didn't want Our Lord's Holy Religion, but rather to live like feral beasts, so now they're going to reap what they've sown.

I ran the funding systems for Victorian state schools during the late eighties and first half of the nineties. This was just after the business about schools not being "girl friendly" started. By 1995 there were programs for girls in every school in the state and not a single thing for boys anywhere. You get what you pay for.

The growing number of women in leadership positions is a symptom of our indulgent but declining civilisation. Women spend and redistribute while men build and create. No civilisation that allows women to lead will last. Women in leadership roles is just a symption of our decline. Poorer countries don't have the luxury to indulge women. They will compete to win because they have to. We will decline until we too are too poor to indulge our spoilt women.

Well there goes the disenfranchisement of men. And the rise of thuggery and crime if there is no alternative.

@Stuart. L

I think once the men finish building robots which would self-improve and evolve and reproduce their own kind. Then they can throw off the men if they want to. But maybe skynet won't be so nice to them either.

I know it's typical for middle class women in their early 20s to suggest that they might not ever want to have children; by their mid 20s they are still uncertain but starting to waver; and by their late 20s many have shifted to positively wanting children.

Thanks for the great news, Oz! Now that I've spent my twenties and a good chunk of my thirties busting my ass in the world to reach middle management in the corporate world and am finally making the $300K salary I always wanted, I can trade in my chips and pay full price for a used woman and take sloppy seconds from douchebags and bad boys who got it for free! This is an awesome deal and I'm glad you pointed it out for me!

That's a snarky comment. I've done everything I can to criticise delayed family formation.

The fact that many middle-class women now seem to be considering motherhood in their late 20s is a step forward. When I was 25 and wanting to marry, a lot of my female peers put off such things for some vague time in their late 30s.

I know the phenomenon of women dating inappropriate men in their 20s before looking for a family guy in their 30s exists. I've written many posts on that myself and have advised men that it's a deal that ought to be rejected.

But at the same time there are some attractive young women I know who married decent men in their mid-20s and who are now starting their families in their late 20s. That may be later than ideal, but it's not hopeless.